Question on Hot Water Heater Recirc. Pump

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beantech

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Miami, FL
Hi...new to the forums and had a question.

We recently purchased a 2 year old house that has what I believe to be a recirculation pump near the bottom of the water heater in the garage. It runs into the bottom of the water heater where the drain is located.

Now if I understand this correctly, this is a recirc. pump that constantly moves a small amount of water through the hot lines so that when hot water is needed at a faucet, the wait isn't as long to get it.

My issue is that the pump appears to be failing. It stops at various times (not on a timer) and has to be unplugged for a time to "reset" and then it starts working again. The thing I don't understand is that when the pump isn't working and is unplugged, we never get truly HOT water....it gets warm and mildly hot, but not at all close to what it is with the pump running. My theory is that when the pump isn't running, the faucet is actually drawing hot water from both the top and bottom of the heater. Since the colder water in the heater is at the bottom, it creates a "mix" of both really hot and just mildly hot water. Does this make sense?

Anyway, I'm having the pump replaced tomorrow and wanted to tell the plumber to put an inline shutoff valve on the line right before the pump. This way, if it fails again, I can simply close that valve and the faucets will then pull the hot water ONLY from the top of the water heater. For that matter, we may not even mind the slight wait to get the hot water from the tank and may just leave the pump disabled with that valve closed?

I hope I explained that correctly, and appreciate any comments and suggestions you may have.

Thanks,
Mark in FL
 
Mark, you are correct that you must be drawing some water from the bottom of the tank. There should be a check valve on the recirculating line near the heater. It was either not installed or it is not working.

John
 
I built a home in Michigan years ago and a Plumber buddy of mine helped me install the copper plumbing. We used 1" main instead of 3/4" (what a difference) We ran the 1" the full length of the basement to the furthest bath, then tee'd off with 1/2" back to the heater drain. Insulated both pipes and it circulated itself with the little bit of difference of heat in the pipe from start to finish. No pump needed. We also put a check valve in the 1/2" line so the water had to come from the top of the heater. It worked great.
 
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